Recording tapes of 6.25mm width and of average thickness are used in the form of open spools and are usually stored in cases or boxes made of plastic or cardboard. Narrow and extra-thin magnetic sound tapes are normally supplied in cassettes designed to prevent dust from finding its way onto the sensitive tape and also to protect the tape from mechanical damage. Since the thin (and very fragile magnetic tape) is exposed at the mouth of the cassette, a plastic box is usually supplied, which contains one or more cassettes and from which the latter are removed as and when required. Difficulties are encountered, however, in the storage or stacking of the widely-used so-called "compact" cassettes; the plastic box which protects them has, when closed, a parallelpipedal shape with smooth outer surfaces, so that, owing to the light weight of the cassette and its box and the resulting danger of slipping, it is not practicable to stack more than a very small number of boxes on top of one another.
Various aids have therefore already been devised for the methodical storage of small and large numbers of boxes containing compact cassettes. One simple device consists of a stand having a flat base surface which accommodates the narrow longitudinal sides of the boxes and causes them to stand upright by means of narrow side panels and partitions, while the rear wall of the stand consists of a continuous strip. If the stand is inclined, it is possible to slide a number of cassettes and their boxes into the angle formed by the base surface and the rear strip, so that the cassettes occupy exactly similar positions. A device designed to accommodate six boxes can be extended as desired, by connecting similar devices together in side-by-side relation in accordance with the form-locking principle. In this system the boxes themselves are exposed and subject to dust, as are the stands, and, if the boxes are numerous, the number of stands which are required form an excessively long row.
Another known device for accommodating a larger number of cassettes (each in its own box) comprises four compartments, each open at the front and mounted in a square on a turntable in such a way that six cassettes in their boxes can be inserted into each of the compartments through its open front. While it is true that the capacity of this system can be increased by mounting a number of such devices one above the other, the rotatable arrangement is inhibited by the fixed order in which the sets or collections of cassettes are arranged. The cost and amount of apparatus involved in a system of this kind are by no means negligible and, although the cassettes in their boxes are protected, the apparatus as a whole is exposed to dust. A common feature of the known devices for accommodating a number of compact cassettes is that they are more or less open and thus exposed to the ingress of foreign matter. The compact cassettes themselves, however, are protected inside their separate boxes, standing in the said devices. These and other difficulties experienced with the prior art devices have been obviated in a novel manner by the present invention.
It is, therefore, an outstanding object of the present invention to provide a plastic box to accommodate a cassette of recording tape such as that widely used at the present time, (the so-called "D" cassette).
Another object of this invention is the provision of a plastic box of the said type which can be used to form a device for accommodating a number of compact cassettes and which enables each compact cassette itself to be gripped by the user with a simple manipulation and removal from the box in readiness for playing, thus providing, practically without the need for any essential additional components, an ideal means of storing and accommodating compact cassettes.
With these and other ojbects in view, as will be apparent to those skilled in the art, the invention resides in the combinations of parts set forth in the specification and covered by the claims appended hereto.